


You Fight Like You Practice

by Redrikki



Category: The Dragon Prince (Cartoon)
Genre: Gen, Swordfighting, Yuletide
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-12-24
Updated: 2018-12-24
Packaged: 2019-08-25 03:52:53
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,389
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/16653751
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Redrikki/pseuds/Redrikki
Summary: Callum's never been comfortable with swords. Two lessons, two teachers, and one real fight.





	You Fight Like You Practice

**Author's Note:**

  * For [nitpickyabouttrains](https://archiveofourown.org/users/nitpickyabouttrains/gifts).



> Title comes from one of my fencing master's favorite expressions. Thank you Maestro Wilson for teaching me what competent sword instruction looks like, and also how to stab people. 
> 
> Dear recipient, this might be a bit darker than what you were looking for, but I couldn't help it. It sprang to my head fully formed like Athena, demanding to be born. Hope you enjoy it.
> 
> Doubles for my hurt/comfort bingo prompt "fighting."

_Then…_

Callum landed hard on his butt and slumped back agains the hard-packed dirt of the training ground with a groan. His ears rang with the force of Soren’s blow. Less than five minutes into sword practice, and he was already feeling done for the day.

Soren loomed over him, his head blotting out the sun. “How are you still so bad at this?” he asked, shaking his head in exasperation. 

“Practice, I guess,” Callum said as he gingerly explored the growing goose egg on his forehead. At least it wasn’t bleeding. He supposed he should be grateful Soren had mostly pulled his blow when it was clear Callum wasn’t going to parry in time. So grateful. He’d get right on that as soon as his ears stopped ringing.

All joking aside, he really didn’t know why he was still so terrible. Soren was an amazing fighter. Just watching him should be an education. He’d been giving Callum lessons for months now and so far it felt like all he’d learned was that he was a lousy swordsman. Every day they came out here so Soren could wack him, but he didn’t seem to be getting any better, just more bruises. 

Callum groaned again, rubbing his aching backside. “Remind me, why are we doing this again?”

Soren rolled his eyes. “Because you’re a prince, we’re at war, and no one can afford for you to be this useless.”

Callum winced. Of all the blows Soren had struck today, that one hurt the worst, mostly because it was true. Drawing was pretty much the only thing he was good at and that wasn’t good enough. Ezran was going to be the king someday and he didn’t need a royal artist. He needed a general, someone he could count on to keep their people safe. Right now, that wasn’t Callum. 

“Alright, alright.” Callum gritted his teeth and hauled himself to his feet. Then he bent back down to pick up the practice sword he’d forgotten the first time. He took up a guard position and tried to brace himself for the coming blow. 

*  
*  
*  
_Now…_

Callum watched Rayla run through her training routine in the pre-dawn light, his pencil poised uselessly above the page. He’d seen her fight two-handed before, but he’d been a little too preoccupied with not dying to really appreciate the finer points of her technique. While the style Soren had tried to teach him was all about hacking and stabbing, Rayla’s was more sweeping and slashing. Her movements flowed together like the steps of a beautiful, deadly dance. If all the Moonshadow elves were this terrifyingly graceful, it was no wonder they were the most feared assassins in the world. Callum signed and set his sketchbook aside. There was no way to capture that on the page.

Rayla’s turned at the sound of his sigh. “What?” she asked defensively, her eyes narrowing. 

“Sorry.” Callum flushed. “I’m just trying to figure out your whole—” he made a vague slashing motion. “You have two swords, but it doesn’t look like you’re attacking with both of them.”

“Because I’m not. I attack with one hand and defend with the other.” She demonstrated as she talked, slashing with her right hand while making a sweeping motion with her left. 

“So you really do have a slish hand.”

Rayla laughed. “Well, sort of,” she said with a shrug. “It changes with where the blow’s coming from. Here, let me show you.” 

She slish-slashed a nearby shrub and tossed him a set of branches. Of course he fumbled them and, by the time he’d picked them up, Rayla was already standing ready with her own pair of twig swords. 

“Alright,” she said, hefting her makeshift weapons, “come at me.”

Callum hesitated, sure he’d heard that wrong. “You want _me_ to come at _you_ ,” he said slowly, trying to work it out. In his experience, that was pretty much the opposite of how training went unless Soren was trying to help him impress Claudia. He was pretty sure that wasn’t what was happening here.

“Of course I want you to attack me,” Rayla said with an exasperated eye roll. “How am I supposed to teach you without demonstrating it?”

“Oh.” That made a lot of sense actually, even if it did feel a little weird. “Here goes,” he said and aimed a blow at her head. 

Rayla deflected it easily with her slish hand and slashed at his unprotected belly with her right. “Got it?” she asked as she went back to guard. “Coming to you,” she said and swung for his head. 

She came in slow, slower than he’d ever seen her move before. So slow, in fact, that it was almost impossible for him not to parry the blow. “I got it!” he crowed. He couldn’t remember the last time that happened, mostly because it hadn’t.

“Good job,” she said with only a hint of her usual sarcasm. “Now follow up.”

“What? Oh, yeah.” Reposting. Callum always forgot that was a thing, mostly because he never really got that far. He slashed her across the stomach like he was supposed to.

Rayla nodded crisply and stepped back to guard. “Again,” she said, and they did. Over and over, faster and faster, until Callum’s arms felt like they were melting and Ezran and Zym woke up demanding breakfast. 

*  
*  
*  
_Later_

Callum crouched over Rayla’s prostrate form to see if she was alright. She was breathing, thanks the gods, but didn’t seem like she’d be moving any time soon. A few feet away, Soren was doing the same with an unconscious Claudia. 

“Is she—” Callum hesitated, almost afraid to finish the thought.

Claudia moaned quietly as her brother turned her over. “She’s alive,” Soren said, and Callum released a breath he hadn’t realized he was holding. The girls were alive. That was good. Everything was good, except for the part where his new friend and his old friends were trying to kill each other. 

Soren didn’t look any happier about this situation than Callum was. In fact, he looked practically green and kept swallowing like he was trying not to throw up. Still, there was something in his eyes that made Callum nervous.

“Ezran, go,” he hissed at his brother. 

“But—” Ezran looked uncertainly between Callum and Soren. 

He still trusted the royal guard to protect him. Callum had once too, back before they’d held him down while Viren stole his voice. Soren’s hand drifted towards the hilt of his sword and Callum’s heart leapt into his throat.

“Ezran, run!” 

Soren shot to his feet, sending Callum lunging for Rayla’s fallen swords. Ezran snatched up Zym and ran like a rabbit with a hound at its heels. Soren made as if to give chase, but Callum rose to block his path.

“It doesn’t have to be like this,” Callum said, struggling to keep his hands steady and voice level. His palms were sweating so much it was a miracle he managed to keep ahold of the swords. “Come with us. Help us bring the Dragon Prince to his mom, and we can end the war.”

“You really think you have what it takes to win this war?” Soren sneered. “You don’t even know how to use those,” he said, jerking his head at the swords.

Callum shook his head. “Not win. End.” He doubted Soren would ever go for it, but the longer they kept talking, the further away Ezran got. 

“End?!” Soren yelled. “The king is dead!”

“I know,” Callum said, his voice breaking. He’d suspected since the night they left the castle and known for sure since Rayla had explained about the bindings. Hearing it aloud though hurt worse than he was expecting. He swallowed hard and pushed through the pain. “All the more reason why we need to make peace.”

Something hardened in Soren’s expression. “Dad was right, you don’t deserve to be prince!” he cried and swung at Callum’s head. 

Callum felt a split second of raw, instinctive terror. He had never won a real fight with Soren before and there was so much riding on this one. Then he caught Soren’s blade with his slish hand and slashed at his unprotected belly with his right. It was just like he and Rayla had practiced but the results were so much redder.


End file.
